Paypal -- Virtue Signaling or Hypocrisy

Paypal recently announced that they would not be expanding a facility they have in Charlotte, N.C.

The reason given by Paypal was opposition to a new State law. As stated in the announcement, 

"...The new law perpetuates discrimination and it violates the values and principles that are at the core of PayPal’s mission and culture.  As a result, PayPal will not move forward with our planned expansion into Charlotte..."

The announcement doesn't specify the law.  However, on March 24, the Governor of NC signed  House Bill 2, the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act. That Act establishes a State policy that requires people to use public bathrooms that correspond with their biological gender. So I assume this is the law that Paypal finds violates its values and culture (although I wonder what would happen in one of PayPal's bathrooms if a biological male decided to use a crowded women's room because he identified as a female that hour).

The possible hypocrisy is because back in 2015, PayPal partnered with Network International to serve the market in Dubai (United Arab Emirates aka UAE). Article 354 of the Federal Penal Code of the UAE states, "Whoever commits rape on a female or sodomy with a male shall be punished by death." A separate law prohibits "... intercourse contrary to nature...".

prohibits “personal intercourse contrary to nature” - See more at: http://www.refugeelegalaidinformation.org/united-arab-emirates-lgbti-resources#sthash.9yyBGwJO.dpuf

prohibits “personal intercourse contrary to nature” - See more at: http://www.refugeelegalaidinformation.org/united-arab-emirates-lgbti-resources#sthash.9yyBGwJO.dpuf

prohibits “personal intercourse contrary to nature” - See more at: http://www.refugeelegalaidinformation.org/united-arab-emirates-lgbti-resources#sthash.9yyBGwJO.dpuf

PayPal also has an office in Moscow, Russia. In that country, transgendered people are prohibited from driving.

So is PayPal being a hypocrite.  In defense of Paypal, in neither Russia nor the UAE does the law specifically prohibit use of bathrooms the way the N.C. law does. Of course, a common sense view of the Russian and UAE law leads to belief that these places are far worse for transgendered (and gays and lesbians and bisexuals) than N.C.

Actually, I think it is also possible that PayPal may have decided not to expand in Charlotte anyway and figured they would use the opportunity to 'virtue signal'.

In either case, based on common sense, it seems to me that PayPal is being hypocritical, although in a more literal sense they are not.


Report on NC bathroom law is here.
Paypal's corporate announcement regarding the Charlotte, NC Expansion is here
Announcement regarding the PayPal operation in the UAE is here 
Info on the law regarding homosexuality in the UAE is here.
Info on cases of enforcement against GLBT is here.
Minimal info on PayPal in Moscow, Russia is here
Article on driving in Russia by Transgendered is here.

Nick Hanauer, Pitchforks and the Minimum Wage

In 2014 at a TED talk and then at the on line website Politico, Nick Hanauer (image one) made the case for a big rise in the minimum wage. The case was made on the basis of economic justice but also of self interest. Hanauer essentially said that it was in the best interests of the very rich to drastically increase salaries, since without  doing so there might be pitchforks out to get them.

Here is a quote from that opinion piece,

"...If we don’t do something to fix the glaring inequities in this economy, the pitchforks are going to come for us. No society can sustain this kind of rising inequality. In fact, there is no example in human history where wealth accumulated like this and the pitchforks didn’t eventually come out...."

This week, a report emerged that one of Hanauer's companies, which is the "Pacific Coast Feather Company" (he is the Chairman), hired workers recently at about the federal minimum wage in Gaston County North Carolina (actually the minimum wage was $7.25 at the time and they were hired at $7.50) and doing so while getting a State subsidy (image two is the company getting a ceremonial State Flag). 

Now there are a few things that could be keeping this from being hypocrisy.

The first is timing. The opinion piece is from June 2014. 

The opening of the company's North Carolina operation (third image) may have preceded the opinion piece (interestingly, about the time plant was opened, a company plant in Nebraska was severely damaged by a tornado). 

The second is also timing. Hanauer's pitchfork theory may only mean that the very rich have X years to fix things and that he plans to raise the wages at the NC operation before the X year deadline. 

The third is knowledge. Hanauer, although Chairman of the company, might not actually know what people were going to be paid at the NC operation.

Of course the most likely thing is that Hanauer was just spouting fluff at the TED talk and in the opinion piece as most of his companies are high tech and pay above the minimum wage as a matter of course. Also Hanauer is active in left wing politics, including managing 'dark' money contributions.









Hanauer's opnion piece in Politico is here.

Report on Hanauer's company is here.

Gaston County's report on the company's opening is here.

Article tying the Nebraska disaster to the North Carolina plant opening is here.

Vox Defends De Caprio from Hypocrisy Charge

In late February 2016, at the Academy Awards (first image), Leo DiCaprio, who received the Best Actor Award, made the following statement,

 “Making The Revenant was about man’s relationship with the natural world. A world that we collectively felt in the 2015, as the hottest year recorded in the history. Our production needed to move to the southern tip of this planet just to find snow. Climate change is real. It’s happening right now. It is the most urgent threat affecting our entire species. And we need to work collectively together and stop procrastinating. We need to support leaders around the world… Who do not speak for the big corporations, but who speak for all of humanity, for the indigenous people of the world, for the billions and billions of underprivileged people who are most affected by this, for our children’s children and for those people out there whose voices have been drowned down by the politics of greed.”

Of course it was pointed out that DiCaprio has, to say the least, a huge carbon footprint.

For example, in 2014, DiCaprio bought a mansion (7000 sq feet, 6 BD 7+ BA) in Palm Spring (see second image). 

DiCaprio also is known to be a frequent traveler on private jets (in one six week period he took a private jet 5 times and he is known to have used a private jet to go to Brazil for the 2014 soccer world cup). In addition, as of 2014, DiCaprio owned two condos (or maybe coops) in Battery City Park, NYC and one in Greenich Village, NYC
  Vox defends DiCaprio by stating that voluntary reduction of carbon by DiCaprio would be insignificant in combating world carbon emissions and that even virtuous action by all celebrities would be insignificant and that DiCaprio gives money to Green charities and organizations. The Vox piece says that DiCaprio is advocating Government action to reduce carbon emissions and that voluntary reduction (or consumption) by DiCaprio is irrelevant to that advocacy. 

Vox could have, but did not, also point out that in 2013 DiCaprio sold his Malibu beachfront (third and fourth image - from Zillow) mansion perhaps being afraid of sea level rise (DiCaprio made about a $10M capital gain on this).

This defense lacks in several ways.

First, DiCaprio's big carbon footprint is a major public relations issue for groups seeking the kind of legislation that DiCaprio advocates. Second, legislation in the U.S. restricting only corporation based carbon emission (as seems to be the DiCaprio wish) would also be insignificant since the US only is one country and, anyway, corporate carbon emissions is only a part of the country's carbon emission  (it seems to me that DiCaprio is part of the Hollywood industry and he probably has incorporated part of his fortune but I'll pass on that).  Third, DiCaprio says "...we need to work collectively together..." which seems to imply not just government action but also volunteer action.

Still, if one assumes that DiCaprio believes government action will cure the problem and that the 'collective' work is only to get legislation and that DiCaprio's private contributions to green organizations offset his consumption and don't cause a PR problem for legislation (a lot of assuming), then you could conclude that he is not a hypocrite.
s



Vox analysis piece is here.
Report on DiCaprio speech with extensive quote is here.
Daily Mail report on DiCaprio homes is here. 
Zillow site with images of DiCaprio mansion in Malibu is here

Chuck Schumer and the Supreme Court Vacancy

On February 14, Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) denounced a fellow Senator (Senator McConnell of KY) for declaring (on Feb 12) that the  Senate would not confirm any justice nominated by President Obama in 2016 to the Supreme Court.

Back in July 2007, Senator Schumer called for blocking any justice nominated by President Bush to the Supreme Court.

Here is a Schumer quote from 2007

"...How do we apply the lessons we learned from Roberts and Alito to be the next nominee, especially if—God forbid—there is another vacancy under this president? … [F]or the rest of this president’s term and if there is another Republican elected with the same selection criteria let me say this: We should reverse the presumption of confirmation. The Supreme Court is dangerously out of balance. We cannot afford to see Justice Stevens replaced by another Roberts, or Justice Ginsburg by another Alito. Given the track record of this president and the experience of obfuscation at the hearings—with respect to the Supreme Court, at least—I will recommend to my colleagues that we should not confirm a Supreme Court nominee except in extraordinary circumstances...."

and here is a series of  Schumer quotes from 2016

"...You know, the kind of obstructionism that Mitch McConnell's talking about, he's harkening back to his old days. You know, he recently he said, 'Well, I want regular order,' ...But in 2010, right after the election or right during the election, he said, 'My number-one job is to defeat Barack Obama,' without even knowing what Barack Obama was going to propose. Here, he doesn’t even know who the president's going to propose and he said, 'No, we're not having hearings [actually the 'no hearings' is arguably a false statement- see below]; we're not going to go forward to leave the Supreme Court vacant at 300 days in a divided time,'.... ".

So, is Schumer a hypocrite?

It does seem that his advocacy in 2007 is 180 degrees from his opinion in 2016 and in fact, the situation in 2007 was further from the election (about 540 days) as opposed to the 300 days Schumer mentions in his 2016 comments. But there are two interesting issues that would allow Schumer to claim that he is less inconsistent than it appears.

1. The 2007 comments were, in effect, null.  This was because no supreme court vacancy appeared that year.

2. Schumer probably believes that only opinions similar to Schumer's are objectively legitimate. Although Schumer would undoubtedly not say it so bluntly, his 2007 remarks seem to clearly indicate that opinions outside some region essentially disqualify people from appointment to the Supreme Court.  Also, in all probability, even associating with the 'wrong' people would, in Schumer's mind, be a disqualifying fact as would various other facts if Schumer didn't like the candidate. These factors would allow Schumer to tell himself that he is not a hypocrite although I personally consider the fact to point the other way.

Another factoid I came across while doing research on this is the 28 month nomination process endured by Miguel Estrada (nominated in 2001 by George W Bush for Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit). This was, to this date, the only Appeals Court nomination ever filibustered and Schumer was one of the leaders of the filibuster (there were 7 cloture votes over the 28 months). The guilt by association may have been because Estrada did legal work for the Bush team in the "Bush vs Gore" post 2000 election drama.

Two days after his Feb 14 remarks Schumer realized his 2007 remarks were being cited by various analysts and critics. He tried to make a distinction between his 2007 remarks and the Feb 12, 2016 remarks by Senator McConnell. He said that in 2007 he was willing to hear testimony but not confirm while Senator McConnell was not even willing to listen to testimony. Actually McConnell says "we won't confirm" not "we won't listen" and it only implied a possible "we won't hold hearings". Even if McConnell had said the latter it would be a minimal difference.



News report at CNS which reports Schumer's 2016 comments - this was sent me by Irwin with an implication that it might make a good hypocrisy analysis.
Post on The Hill which contains Schumer quotes (from 2016) and a video of them
Post on Breitbart which contains Schumer quot from 2007.
Opinion Piece in the NY Times about Schumer's role in blocking Miquel Estrada (2003).
Report in WallStreetJournal on Estrada's support for nomination of Elana Kagan  and her high opinion of him (2010)
Report of Senator McConnell's Feb 12, 2016 remarks on the Supreme Court Vacancy
Article in Washington Examiner saying that Schumer doesn't want his 2007 speech used against him.

Youtube of Schumer speaking before the American Constitution Society in July 2007. He is cheered seemingly unanimouisly. This is followed by footage of Schumer speaking on "This Week" on Feb 14, 2016 (nice to have both on the same video)..

Dr. Ben Carson and the Convicted Dentist - Did their friendship result in hypocrisy

In the center of the image (taken in 2005) is Dr. Ben Carson who, as of this post, is seeking the Republican nomination for President. On the right is a dentist named Dr. Al Costa.

The two met in the 1990s and did charity work together. They then became best friends and business partners in various real estate ventures.

In 2007, Dr. Costa was charged with defrauding medical insurance by billing for procedures not performed. According to the charges, this began in 1995 and by the time Costa retired from dentistry later in about 2004 (he gave up his dental licence then), the fraud, per the charge against him, amounted to about $44,000.  In 2007, Costa pleaded guilty to most of the charges. A sentencing hearing took place in 2008. Dr.Carson testified as a character witness for Costa and asked the court for leniency. Costa took responsibility for his actions and showed remorse and was given a sentence of house arrest, community service and a $250,000 fine (in addition to restitution of the $44,000) but no jail time.

In 2012, Carson authored a book "America the Beautiful".  In the book he says the following regarding medical fraud, "I would not advocate chopping off people’s limbs, but there would be some very stiff penalties for this kind of fraud, such as loss of one’s medical license for life, no less than 10 years in prison, and loss of all of one’s personal possessions.

So the question, would seem to be whether Carson changed his mind or is a hypocrite. The fact that Carson is still friends with Costa might weigh the decision to the hypocrisy side.

But, there is an oddity in that 2012 book that overtakes this argument. In that book, Carson cites the case of an overzealous prosecutor hunting down a dentist (he does not name the dentist but it is surely Costa)  to gain publicity or penalty money.  

So, in effect, though Costa admits guilt, Carson says Costa isn't guilty. I think this might mean his plea for leniency was hypocritical if he stated Costa was guilty in that testimony but I can't get the raw testimony. (I spent considerable time looking for it - I suspect the testimony carefully was crafted to avoid acknowledgement of Costa's guilt).

So, although Carson may be guilty of a 2008 hypocrisy, it seems the 2012 book, assuming it is taken at face value, can not be a case of hypocrisy.

Here is an article from the AP on Carson (it has the image)
Here is an article from something called Rawstory (which has a lot of detail and direct quotes from Carson's book)
Here is an article from yahoo news - it is the one Irwin sent me that got me to look at this subject.

Not hypocrisy even though a contradiction

Recently, some students and faculty at Princeton University discovered (notwithstanding that this has been common knowledge for many decades) that Woodrow Wilson was a racist. There was, thus a series of motions and/or request and/or demands to have the name of Woodrow Wilson removed from buildings on campus.

The NY Times, essentially approved of this in an editorial in November 2015.

Going back a hundred years, however, the NY Times was a big supporter of Woodrow Wilson in both the 1912 and 1916 election for President of the US.

A hundred years ago, none of the current editorial board of the NYTimes worked for that newspaper. Even if they had, the time is enough for someone to change their mind. Of course, the NYTimes, in 2015 should have admitted that they were pro-Wilson in their 2015 editorial (they didn't) but that is just a mistake of detail.

 2015 editorial here


Links to 1912 and 1916 endorsement of Woodrow Wilson here.

Is the Spokesperson = the Department

rBack in October 2014 during Operation Protective Edge, then State Department Press Secretary Jen Psaki denounced Israel after an IDF air attack near a hospital in Gaza using the words 'appalling' and 'unjustified'. This was before an investigation was completed (probably before an investigation was underway).

Now in October 2015, the US carried out an air attack in Afghanistan.  State Department Deputy Spokesman, Mark Toner said many, many things but basically said (I'm paraphrasing) 'let's wait for the investigation'.

There are some differences in the two situations.

1. Maybe Afghan personnel called in the air attack in the 2015 case.

2. The weapons used by Hamas in 2014 and the Taliban in 2015 are probably different.

most interesting to me

3. Psaki is a different person from Toner although both speak for the Dept of State.

So what  may have here (ignoring differences such as 1 and 2 above) is that neither Psaki or Toner are hypocrites but the US State Department is.

Transcript of the 2015 press conference is here.

o 

Dr. Ben Carson on Meet the Press Constitution Hypocrite or Guy with an Opinion

Dr. Ben Carson is a neurosurgeon running for President of the US. He was on the TV show Meet the Press on Sept 20, 2015 (image shows Chuck Todd of Meet the Press on the left and Carson on the right).

Several people (e.g., my brother, PBS, Mike Gerson - as syndicated writer for the Washington Post, the Herald Tribute and other outlets, etc.) have implied that Dr. Carson is a hypocrite or possibly ignorant of the Constitution. This is with respect to the issue of a Muslim President of the U.S.

I'll quote Mr. Gerson in the Herald Tribute,

"...

What is the proper response from a prospective president to the question: Is being a Muslim disqualifying for the presidency?

Ben Carson answered that he “would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation” because Islam is incompatible with the Constitution. The Constitution offers a different reply: “No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”

Gerson here makes an inference that seems to be made by essentially everyone criticizing Carson but that I would not make.  The inference is that when Carson says, '...would not advocate...', Carson means, '...should be banned from being President...' .  

I see the two statements as different. To illustrate, I don't thing many people would advocate 'putting an ideologically committed Satanist in charge of this nation' (actually the President is not 'in charge' of the nation, the President serves the nation but that's another story).  To me, that doesn't mean that everyone who says that is a hypocrite, just that they have an opinion. I think most of those people who would not advocate 'putting...Satanist...' would none the less agree that the Constitution does not prohibit Satanists from serving.  Thus I don't find the statement hypocritical.

The fact that the issue arose for Islam is simply because some notorious and significant terrorist groups (e.g., ISIS, Boko Haram, Al Qaeda, al Shabaab) are self described Islamic organizations.

Gerson's piece for the Herald Tribute is here.

Policy vs blog at the NY Times

After the Charlie Hedbo terror attack in Paris, a number of publications showed the cover of the next issue with Mohammud saying "Tout est Pardonne" (all is forgiven). The NY Times published a story without the image. In any interview in Jan 2015,

“Out of respect to our readers we have avoided those we felt were offensive,” New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet told The Huffington Post on Monday night, shortly after the Charlie Hebdo cover was released online. “Many Muslims consider publishing images of their prophet innately offensive and we have refrained from doing so,” Baquet said.

Yesterday, the NYTimes, in a blog post, had an article on a protest some over some 'art'  which had an image of a portrait of Pope Benedict XVI made of condoms. The article had the portrait.

The blogpost indicates that the image of Benedict was meant to be negative, perhaps offensive,

Niki Johnson of Milwaukee, the artist who created the work, said in an interview that she disagreed with Benedict’s conservative social positions, including a statement that condoms could contribute to the spread of AIDS in Africa. The portrait, she said, is “not hate-based,” but rather a way to critique Benedict’s views while raising awareness about public health.“What I want to do is really destigmatize the condom, normalize it,” Ms. Johnson says.
 
A key issue here is whether the policy of the NY Times included blogs. If yes, they are hypocrites, if no, then not.

Interview with Huffington Post is here.
Blogpost with image of Benedict XVI is here.

Today, there was an interview given to the Washington Examiner. In the interview, the NY Times spokesman defended their blog and did not invoke the 'it was a blog' defense. The defense is someone incoherent but here is an interesting portion, 

"...Hundreds of thousands of people protested worldwide, for instance, after the Danish cartoons were published some years ago. While some people might genuinely dislike this Milwaukee work, there doesn't seem to be any comparable level of outrage...."

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that what the NYTimes means to say is something like, "Catholics don't kill you when they are insulted, muslims do" but the NYTimes obviously can't bring themselves to actually say that.
 t
said,
 

The NY Times and the Catholic Church

The NY Times was enthusiastic about the Pope's recent encyclical which called for action on climate change. From their editorial on June 19, 2015

 "...The timing of “Laudato Si” could not have been better. In December, delegates from nearly 200 nations will gather in Paris to make one more attempt at a global arrangement that would commit all nations to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, before atmospheric concentrations reach what some believe is the point beyond which truly intolerable consequences are inescapable...."

Back a few years ago Obamacare was beginning to be litigated on religious grounds related to drugs that cause abortion and so forth.  Then the NY Times was not so enthusiastic. From their editorial of May 27 2012,

"...Under the Constitution, churches and other religious organizations have total freedom to preach that contraception is sinful and rail against Mr. Obama for making it more readily available. But the First Amendment is not a license for religious entities to impose their dogma on society through the law. The vast majority of Americans do not agree with the Roman Catholic Church’s anti-contraception stance, including most American Catholic women...."

Interestingly, the 2015 encyclical also is against abortion and against gay marriage but the NY Times seems not to have noticed.

The two issues (abortion and climate change) are not the same and furthermore, it seems to me that abortion is more a legitimate religious issue than climate change. Anyway, it shows clearly that the NY Times is not above cherry picking pieces of doctrine they like and ignoring or dismissing as irrelevant doctrine that they dislike and, or course don't tell their readers about this in an honest and straightforward way.

Can Tweets be Hypocritical

Salon is an opinion website on the left of the political spectrum.

In the image are two tweets from Salon.com (slnm.us). One is from 2013 after the terror attack at the Boston marathon and says, 

"Muslims don't need to apologize for the Tsarnaevs" 

the other is from a few days ago and says 

"White America must answer for the Charleston church massacre"

Whether we have hypocrisy or not seems to be a matter of whether Salon.com is a unitary body or whether the individuals (they are different individuals) who tweeted for Salon.com are considered outside of their Salon.com affiliation.  Also the tweet from 2013 links to a summary of research which purports to back up the tweet. However, I am quite skeptical of research summarized by advocates, especially 'social science' research.

Günter Grass Dies; Was he a hypocrite? Yes- but small potatoes.

 

Gunter Grass died on April 13, 2015. I didn't get around to writing about this until today. Grass won the Nobel prize in literature in 1999. His early novels told stories with the setting being the 1930s and 1940s and, per almost all readers and critics, urged Germans to confess and repent for their Nazi past. In 1985, Grass criticized the visit to the Bitburg cemetery by US President Reagan and German Chancellor Kohl.

However, Grass himself had a Nazi past in that he served in the Waffen SS.  He revealed this in 2006 just prior to marketing a new literary product.  He may have considered his novels or his left wing politics to be a repentance but never said so.

Was he a hypocrite? Well, yes but not to an enormous extent as his service with the Waffen SS was relatively short (a few months in 1944). This assumes he did not participate in any atrocities (no evidence to date has been provided of such participation).

Was he smug? Yes. Opportunistic? Yes. Sanctimonious? Yes. Was he wrong on major issues (he predicted the reunification of Germany would lead to the militarization of Germany and a new military conflict caused by Germany)? Yes.  

He also wrote, in 2012, a famous poem that essentially said that Iran should get a nuclear bomb because Israel had one.

All the info in this (but not the image), is available from the wikipedia page on Grass.  

 

 

Facebook and the image of Mohammed

Two weeks ago, the CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, had a post on his facebook page (yes he is also a customer) that said, 

"A few years ago, an extremist in Pakistan fought to have me sentenced to death because Facebook refused to ban content about Mohammed that offended him..."

Now Facebook is cooperating on the censoring of websites with images of Mohammed where those websites come from Turkey.
.

Is Zuckerberg a hypocrite. Not in my estimation.

He merely didn't distinguish between US originating websites and those in other countries. He is also guilty of being pompous because he didn't do that.

Facebook, like other multinational countries, must obey the laws of the countries in which they do business even if those laws are stupid or tyrannical (in any event, Turkish citizens can easily access French or US websites and see all the images they want, including those purporting to be of Mohammed (it seems to me interesting that since nobody knows what Mohammed actually looked like, besides a few obvious things, e.g., he was male, he wore robes, he had a goatee or beard), nobody who is accused of drawing Mohammed is actually doing so).

The image is from a Washington Post story, here.